Police Incident Reporting System - Visit by Minister Joe Mizzi

The Police Incident Reporting System (PIRS) was designed to replace the manual system used by the Police to record incidents and complaints from the public.

The Minister was informed that up to the end of March 1997 reports received at Police Stations were recorded into registers known as COB's (Commissioner's Occurrence Book). Reports of a criminal nature were transmitted to Police Headquarters via a point-to-point computer system which lacked the structure of proper network. Copies of these reports were then sent to several branches such as CID and Security Branch. Another copy of this summarised report was sent to the Statistics Office who on their part re-generated the report on specially designed data entry forms and re-keyed the information into the police PRIME computer system which serviced to provide the Police statistical information.

All this reproduction was time consuming and proving difficult for the Police to utilise the information collated. The nature of the system did not encourage analysis of the data collected.

The information obtained by the reporting officer was not formalised, very often relevant information was missing and data was often inaccurate. This was mainly due to mistakes at the time of reporting and subsequent copying to the relevant logs and communication methods.

The New System

It is accepted that data must be entered as close to the source of the information as possible (i.e. the Police Stations) and for this reason network was designed and implemented which covers 23 sites and the General Headquarters in Floriana. The information received is given a structure to improve the quality and completeness of the report. Several key fields are mandatory while others are restricted to particular entries only (i.e. fields which only accept a pre-defined set of values). The Minister was told that

this ensures that any future searches on these fields provide positive results. All incidents are categorised at district level and subsequently re-classified according to our laws by Statistics Office personnel. This ensures that proper statistical information is available to every officer from any site throughout the network. Instant access is available to all officers requesting information concerning their districts and divisions. This will allow for better deployment of resources and crime control and prevention.

The system allows the user to search for any incident which was reported to the Police through a list of pre-defined search fields which include details of the person who has filed the report, location of the incident, incident date, victim and suspect details, incident type and other important items such as vehicle, property and weapon information.

On the security side the Commissioner of Police explained that the confidentiality of every report is respected with every intrusion into a report being monitored and registered. This includes any updating and editing made to any report. Each user is granted access rights according to his requirements.

The PIRS presently caters for all incidents of a criminal nature (e.g. theft, bodily harm, sexual offences etc.) and several other reports such as fires, dangerous structures, sudden death etc. During the next phase missing person reports, lost and found property and road accident reports will be added.

The Minister was informed that in future, developments will include Crime Analysis, Charges, Stolen Property databases and templates of various common reports.

LIST OF SITES INSTALLED WITH THE PIRS

District 1 Valletta District 6 Sliema

St Julian's

Msida

District 2 Qormi District 7 Hamrun

Zebbug Rabat

District 3 Paola District 8 B'Kara

Luqa Naxxar

Fgura

District 4 Cospicua District 9 Mosta

Zabbar Qawra

District 5 Zejtun District 10 Victoria

B'Bugia

Zurrieq

GHQ Control Room

Security Seaport

Gudja Airport Station